Issue 11
Mar 2022
Editor’s note
There is nothing more heartbreaking for librarians (maybe it is just me) when we have to tell you we don’t have what you need. The fact is, no library in the world can have every single published item. This is why libraries collaborate to share our resources through services like Interlibrary Loan. Our first article in this issue introduces this vital resource.
But for libraries that don’t have the opportunity to collaborate, their users are either stuck with what their library can afford or rely on open access materials. Open access has, therefore, been seen as a way to push research and science forwards. It has long been a big topic. I started working at HKBU Library for the “Research Visibility Project” that aimed to promote open access – that was almost a decade ago. If you are not familiar with open access, this issue’s articles on our participation in the JSTOR Open Community Collection Initiative and the Open Access Publish Agreement – 2021 Review will give you some ideas.
When you are stuck at home, the Library’s e-resources can help you get what you need. The Library spends about 90% of its budget on e-resources. We subscribe to more than just scholarly databases for journal articles and e-books. We want you to get into the habit of becoming a lifelong learner and thus we have LinkedIn Learning. LinkedIn Learning is a self-paced, video-based learning platform where you can stay on top of the latest technological concepts, improve your interpersonal and communication skills, and learn many different things. Later in this issue Leyao, a year 4 student, will tell you her experience with the LinkedIn Learning course she did. Though, however convenient e-resources are, we do know that print books cannot simply be replaced. To help HKBU users get books held for them at the Main Library, we have rolled out a Held Book Delivery service. You can learn more about it below.
Many of the above Library projects and enhancements would not be possible without support from the Library Systems team. They maintain a stable Library system for our day-to-day use, they also help different Library teams to improve user experience in different areas. In this regard, I am happy to have Mr. Sam Ho joining the Library to lead the Systems team! This issue rounds off with an introduction to Sam.
Maggie Wong
Information Services Librarian
Interlibrary Loan Service helps you to find new publications!
Sometimes due to department budget constraints or other factors, you might not be able to find new publications you need in the Library. The Interlibrary Loan Service can help!
Through our international resource-sharing community network, the Library can help you locate the latest publications from libraries around the world. In many cases, your borrowing request can be fulfilled within a few days (faster than Amazon!) if the lending library is not far from Hong Kong (for physical items) or if your request can be fulfilled electronically (journal article / selected chapter of a book).
Examples of speedy delivery cases:
English Publications
| Case A | Case B | Case C | |
| Request Date | 23 July 2021 | 7 Oct 2021 | 24 Aug 2021 |
| Delivery Date | 26 July 2021 | 7 Oct 2021 | 31 Aug 2021 |
| Requested Title | Shapes from out of nowhere : ceramics from the Robert A. Ellison Jr. collection. | Architecture and the senses in the Italian Renaissance : the varieties of architectural experience | Disease and disability in medieval and early modern art and literature |
| Author | Ellison, Robert A | Karmon, David E | Canalis, Rinaldo F |
| Publication Date | Feb 2021 | April 2021 | April 2021 |
Chinese Publications
| Case A | Case B | Case C | |
| Request Date | 5 Jan 2022 | 6 Jan 2022 | 29 Dec 2021 |
| Delivery Date | 6 Jan 2022 | 11 Jan 2022 | 3 Jan 2022 |
| Requested Title | 《从灵光殿到武梁祠：两汉之交帝国艺术的遗影》 | 《新美术馆学（第1辑）》 | 《汉代墓葬艺术》 |
| Author | 缪哲 | 王璜生 | 谢阁兰 |
| Publication Date | Oct 2021 | Sep 2021 | Oct 2021 |
Late March and April is the season for preparing assignments. Our Interlibrary Loan service provides the speedy and excellent research support you need, helping you locate dissertations, theses, Chinese classics, maps, and more.
- Submit a request (link)
- Enquiries: libill@hkbu.edu.hk / 3411-7445
Looking forward to receiving your Interlibrary Loan requests!
Ka Wai Lee
Circulation & Interlibrary Loan Librarian
Sharing HKBU Library’s digital collections on JSTOR
HKBU Library is committed to preserving distinctive items in the Library’s collection while making them widely accessible. Digitization achieves this by protecting the original works and putting the digital surrogates online for use. Our Library Art Collections contains over 1,800 rare paintings and drawings, historical photographs, missionary maps, vintage posters, prints, and illustrations – all made accessible to the public online.
To expand our outreach efforts, we are participating in the JSTOR Open Community Collection Initiative along with other global libraries. Getting our collection visible on the JSTOR platform enables their discovery alongside relevant books, journals, and primary source materials.
In selecting the collections for submission to JSTOR, we decided that unique and relatively obscure collections that would promote research and scholarship on “less researched” materials would be our focus. We also looked at a variety of item types that were visually appealing. Another factor we took into consideration was copyright. As rights and license information is provided at the item level, we sought to contribute high-resolution image files for items in the public domain. Otherwise, thumbnails were provided.
JSTOR is flexible when it comes to data format. The items we contributed were fully catalogued with Library of Congress Subject Headings and so preparing them for submission did not require unreasonable staff effort to bring the data into conformity with JSTOR’s requirement.
We used FTP to transfer the MARC records and image files to the JSTOR server. The length of time from initial contact through publishing was around one month.
As an initial batch, the three collections published were:
- Derwent Collection features prints documenting the historical development of Macau in the 18th and 19th centuries.
- China Through the Eyes of China Inland Mission Missionaries Collection contains 224 lantern slides and glass plate negatives of Chinese life and culture during 1900 to 1930s. The photographs were taken by the CIM missionaries.
- The China Punch is a satirical comic magazine published in Hong Kong between 1867 and 1876.
It is too soon to evaluate the impact of our content sharing, but giving users direct access to our collections without leaving their preferred research platform offers more opportunities to discover our digital collections. We will monitor the usage via a self-service dashboard developed by JSTOR.
Lolita Kwok
Head of Resource Discovery
Open access publishing agreement – the 2021 review
Following our announcement “Publishing open access with Cambridge University Press for free!” in February 2021, the Library is pleased to provide an update on the articles by HKBU authors published under this agreement with Cambridge University Press (CUP).
Article Processing Charges (APC) for 8 articles published in CUP journals were waived under the agreement in 2021. Without the agreement, the total estimated APCs for making these 8 articles open access would have been over US$26,000.
Without any access restrictions, HKBU scholarship can be disseminated quickly and widely to researchers around the world. It is exciting to see that at the end of February 2022, these 8 articles recorded over 3,600 full-text downloads.
Moreover, the agreement allows HKBU users to gain access to the complete journal content on the CUP platform. The number of accessible journals expanded from around 60 to over 370 titles. Consequently, the total number of full-text views by HKBU users has doubled in a year:
| Accepted articles are written by authors from various disciplines in the HKBU community: | |
|---|---|
| Affiliation | Number of articles in 2021 |
| Music | 1 |
| Religion and Philosophy | 3 |
| Government and International Studies | 2 |
| History | 1 |
| Jao Tsung-I Academy of Sinology | 1 |
The Library is committed to developing an open access culture and raise the visibility of HKBU research output. In January 2022 the Library entered into another open access publishing agreement with the American Chemical Society (ACS). Proactive negotiation with publishers on similar arrangements is ongoing. Check out the dedicated page “Open Access @HKBU” on the latest arrangements for HKBU authors.
Questions about submitting your article to CUP/ACS under the open access publishing agreements? Please contact lib-sct@hkbu.edu.hk.
Wing Woo
Head of Resource Management
“How to succeed in an internal job interview” – A student’s LinkedIn Learning experience
Leyao, a Year 4 student, has just completed a short LinkedIn Learning course “How to succeed in an internal job interview”. This course is a great guide for students needing help to prepare for an internal interview. Read the full article on Leyao’s experiences here.
Interested in this course? Get started! LinkedIn Learning is subscribed to by the Library, available to all HKBU students and staff.
Interested in sharing your experience of taking a LinkedIn Learning course with the university community? Please contact Dr. Simon Wang at the Language Centre by email at simonwang@hkbu.edu.hk for support on multimodal storytelling.
Held Book Delivery Service
No time to pick up held books waiting for you to collect at the Main Library? We have just launched a held book delivery service, which will run this errand for you! If you have held books ready for pick-up at the Main Library, you can pay a service charge to have them delivered either via SF Express lockers or its stores*. Simply login to your library account to submit a request!
*Due to the pandemic, the delivery option of door-to-door delivery is temporarily not available.
Ka Wai Lee
Circulation & Interlibrary Loan Librarian
Introducing our new Systems Librarian – Sam Ho
Hi all, I am Sam Ho, the new Systems Librarian, I joined HKBU Library in December 2021.
I loved reading when I was a kid, so you can imagine how happy I was when I found a job in the library. Reading habits have changed a lot over the past decades. In the past, you had to buy books in a local bookstore or borrow them from a library. The birth of electronic books has changed the landscape completely, you no longer need to go to the bookstore or a library. You can simply buy or borrow electronic books via the Internet with a few mouse clicks, then you can enjoy reading your favorite books even beyond the library’s opening hours. In the past, you can only read electronic books on your personal computer or laptop, but now you can store a few hundred electronic books on a tablet or an ebook reader and carry them anywhere. Similar changes can also be observed in the library services, there is a growing demand for library resources in electronic format rather than physical format.
Under this fast and enormous technological change, it is both a great challenge and opportunity to work in the Library’s Systems team. While technology will continue to evolve and libraries will embrace these technological changes to enhance the services, the role of the librarian to equip users with the information literacy skills and techniques in the digital age will remain unchanged.
Sam Ho
Systems Librarian
Last updated: 10 October 2024